Hier wurde eine berühmte Website geklont. Die Telefonnummern sind nicht die der Klonenden. Dahinter könnte die Absicht stecken, das Recht um Klonen zu testen (es handelt sich hier nicht um Ausgeben der Site eines anderen als die eigene, also um passing off).

Matrix Chambers website
At present still online, but how much longer:
Lando Attorneys website

Not just the layout and colour, but also the text has been largely taken over.
What possessed them to clone this of all websites?

Cherie Booth and her fellow barristers at Matrix Chambers are usually involved in fighting discrimination, protecting human rights and exposing injustice. But Britain’s best-known team of lawyers have had to resort to legal action to defend themselves against internet pirates who are using Matrix’s personnel, host of awards and high reputation in an apparent money-making scam.

The matter isn’t as simple as it looks, because it’s not clear who is behind it and how they benefit. The names of two members of Matrix are given, with the Matrix switchboard number. Attempts by Matrix to have the site removed have been going on for at least a week, apparently.

However, Dr Simon Moores, an internet security expert, said Matrix may not succeed in banishing the Lando website from cyberspace: ‘In my opinion as a non-lawyer, Lando Attorneys are exploring the gap between “passing off” [pretending that someone else’s property is your own], which is illegal, and cloning, which isn’t. This isn’t in my opinion a visible attempt at passing off, though it comes close, because Lando have not used Matrix’s name on their site. I think this is cloning. This is a grey area of the law, which is ambivalent, in regards to websites.’

Note in particular the change in the photo of Kevin, under Staff Team (Who We Are).

From The Observer

Did George Bush steal a German word? The Nürnberger Nachrichten has an article by Evelyn Scherfenberg on German words that have been exported.

Schon auffälliger war, als George Bush 2004 einmal einen politischen Gegner in Alltagsdeutsch abkanzelte: “You are too wischiwaschi!”

The legal connection: apparently this idea that wishy-washy was borrowed from wischiwaschi comes from a book by Prof. Dr. Jutta Limbach, Ausgewanderte Wörter

It looks as if the two terms may have grown up independently in the two languages. Kluge’s etymological dictionary of German says the term means ‘verschwommenes Geschwätz’ (waffle), is pre-20th-c. and was formed on the basis of Gewäsch. The OED gives two meanings: 1. sloppy or insipid food (earliest example 1791) 2 1) feeble or poor in constitution (1703) and 2 b) Feeble or poor in quality or character; trifling, unsubstantial, trashy, ‘milk-and-watery’. †Also rarely as int. = pish! tush!

a1693 Urquhart’s Rabelais iii. xxxvi. 298 Pan. Wishy, washy; Trolly, trolly [orig. Tarabin, tarabas!]. 1797 G. Colman Heir at Law ii. ii, A lord without money be but a foolish, wishy washy kind of a thing a’ter all. 1801 T. Dibdin Il Bondocani iii. ii, None of your wishy washy sparks that mince their steps. 1867 Trollope Chron. Barset I. vii. 55 A weak, wishy-washy man, who had hardly any mind of his own to speak of. 1865 M. E. Braddon Doctor’s Wife iii, Isabel painted wishy-washy looking flowers on Bristol-board from Nature. 1893 Nation (N.Y.) 9 Feb. 106/3 A silly, wishy-washy, inconclusive+style of writing.

The English meaning makes more sense in Bush’s context. Pish! tush! is all I can say.

The London Ambulance Service is allowing its paramedics to have tea breaks, in line with EU practice (don’t they have to have coffee?). Tom Reynolds says they can still go to emergencies, but they can allow trivial cases to wait.

The Sun takes this story as an opportunity to roll out all its usual anti-EU vocabulary (even BILD doesn’t do that, does it?)

PARAMEDICS are being forced to finish tea breaks before attending 999 calls under barmy EU rules.
Ambulance staff warned patients could die after the dozy diktat comes into force today.
…
One paramedic — who did not wish to be named for fear of losing his job — said: “In other parts of Britain, like Manchester, ambulance services have opted out of the European Working Time Directive that enforces breaks.

I wonder if anyone’s collected the Sun’s EU terminology.

I was surprised to read that German public TV will be having live coverage of Prince William’s graduation parade at Sandhurst tomorrow morning, as was Daland Segler in the Frankfurter Rundschau:

Klagen über das miese Fernsehprogramm gehen stets an der Sache vorbei: Denn frei nach Goethe – “Wer vieles bringt, wird manchem etwas bringen” – findet sich im täglichen Angebot immer noch der eine oder andere Beitrag, der dem einen oder anderen zusagt. Nun aber hat die ARD eine Klientel entdeckt, die sie bislang vernachlässigt hat: die Kommissköppe.

Via Astrid Paprotta

The blogger behind Life in Translation has sticky notes to remember which party is which:

Similarly, it ought to be enough that these terms are in my termbase but somehow it isn’t. And so three sticky notes (physical paper, not electronic ones) live on the edge of my screen.
Arrendadora – LESSOR
Arrendatario – LESSEE

Franquiciante – FRANCHISOR
Franquiciado – FRANCHISEE

Fiduciaro – TRUSTEE
Fideicomitente – SETTLOR/TRUSTOR
Fideicomisario – BENEFICIARY/TRUSTEE

I suggest adding MORTGAGOR and MORTGAGEE

Googe patent search

Search of U.S. patents.

Via Streitsache